[Info-vax] VMS internals design, was: Re: BASIC and AST routines

[Hunter Goatley]

On 11/25/2021 8:01 AM, Simon Clubley wrote:
> On 2021-11-24, Chris Townley <news at cct-net.co.uk> wrote:
>> On 24/11/2021 21:45, Hunter Goatley wrote:
>>> On 11/24/2021 1:14 PM, Simon Clubley wrote:
>>>>
>>>> VMS should have been designed 5-10 years later on than when it was.
>>>>
>>>
>>> In a thread of backpedaling inanities, that has to be the most inane.
>>>
>>> Hunter
>>
>> +1
>>
> 
> I am seriously annoyed by that comment Hunter because you have
> completely missed (either accidentally or deliberately) the point
> I am making (and have made before).

I didn't miss your point. Yes, you're right, there are things in VMS 
that make it difficult to port to other architectures.

But your comment I quoted above is inane. If VMS had been designed 5--10 
years later, I doubt it ever would have existed. DEC wouldn't have been 
what they were. VAX would have never been what it was.

VMS is what it is. You might not like it, but it did what it was 
supposed to do when it was designed, and it did it very well.

Your comment is like saying that that people shouldn't have developed 
cell phones until the smart phone was designed. Building blocks. Sure, 
that Nokia flip-phone isn't much now, but we wouldn't be where we are if 
it hadn't existed.

VMS was designed when it was designed because they needed it, and its 
design was exceptional for what it needed to do. You can't change 
history or blame the original designers for not thinking of things that 
were difficult to imagine at the time.

-- 
Hunter
------
Hunter Goatley, Process Software, http://www.process.com/
goathunter at goatley.com   http://hunter.goatley.com/